Search - More Dogs Than Bones on DVD

A real dog

Joseph Haschka | Glendale, CA USA | 02/12/2003

(1 out of 5 stars)

"MORE DOGS THAN BONES is one of those films you pick up in the video rental store when your first, second, and third choices are unavailable. You convince yourself that it looks reasonably clever. Then, after watching it, the self-recrimination is "What was I thinking?"The film opens as Las Vegas mobster Victoria "Vic" Galleti (Mercedes Ruehl) and her henchmen are packing up a million bucks in Franklins that she'll courier to Los Angeles and turn over to her boss. Vic isn't a warm and sensitive lady. On the way to the airport, she so verbally abuses her driver that, after she's in the air, he drops a dime to LA Detective Darren Cody (Peter Coyote) to tell him Galletti is on the way. Then, so Vic's in-flight entertainment can be the anticipation of arrest, the driver calls her cell phone and tells her that he's ratted. Enjoy the slammer, babe! Now desperate, Victoria stashes the money in the carry-on of fellow passenger Raj Lukla (Chaim Jeraffi), a visitor from India on his way to LA to visit his cabdriver nephew, Andy (Ajay Naidu). Vic takes note of Andy's address, which is on Raj's bag. Later, after thumbing her nose at Cody, Galleti sends two assassins, Desalvo (Joe Mantegna) and Quinn (Paul Hipp), to recover the swag. After an initial faux pas involving gunplay and mistaken identity, the two thugs confront Andy and Raj only to learn that the former's dog, Socrates (Sarge), trained to pick up luggage with his teeth, has apparently run off with Raj's bag and buried it. And Socrates isn't talking.After viewing this film with me, my wife remarked that a decent kernel of a plot was lost amidst excessive padding and bad acting. Well, at a run time of 99 minutes, restorative editing might have yielded a 3-star nugget of, say, 10 minutes. Ruehl overacted a character that was potentially the most intriguing. (DeNiro in the role would have been terrific!) Coyote underacted one that was barely credible to begin with. Jerrafi's Raj was pretty much somnolent. Andy and his friends Mary (Debi Mazar), Truman (D.B. Woodside), and Geoff (Glenn Shadix) came across as refugees from an amateurs' acting workshop. The two hoods, Desalvo and Quinn, died premature deaths long before their Big Finale. Even Whoopi Goldberg as Cleo the Caring Animal Control Officer was lifeless and unfunny. Socrates was the most engaging of the lot, but even he was no Rin Tin Tin. And the scene near the film's conclusion involving a constellation of stars shaped like a "9" or a "6", depending on how one looked at it, has to be one of the most excruciatingly stupid things ever put on celluloid.MORE DOGS THAN BONES is a contemporary parable, best left buried, of greed's corrosive effects on otherwise decent people. Check out a library book instead."

Joe Haschka was right, but I read his review AFTER renting

Kevin P. Murphy | Chicago, Illinois USA | 03/04/2003

(1 out of 5 stars)

"We DID pick it up at the video rental store because our top choices weren't available, AND because of the cast. Big mistake! Haschka says it all perfectly.Amen, and forget this one.What WERE they thinking of?"

Yeeesh!!!!

Joseph Haschka | 08/18/2003

(1 out of 5 stars)

"Dialog written by an 11 year old, basically, you'd have to be a complete chump to enjoy this "dog". You'd be better entertained stabbing yourself with a fork."

Hysterical if you have a sense of humor

Allen B. Celestial Pyramid | Albuquerque, NM USA | 04/27/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I don't know what the other two people saw, but if you have a sense of humor and like being entertained this movie is a must! It is a B movie, but so was Best in Show, which this is much better. This is a must buy. For silly fun entertainment watch this movie."